I am greatly enjoying watching the 2018 Winter Olympics in South Korea…although thus far I am a bit underwhelmed by the United States performance overall. Is our precipitous national decline already reflected in international sports, or are the Norwegians, Austrians, Canadians, and other hearty winter folk just having a good Olympics? Only time will tell.

At any rate, to celebrate the Korean Olympics (and put the ups-and-downs of history in perspective) I would like to feature a great treasure of South Korea in today’s post. This is the gold crown of Seobongchong Tumulus, a spectacular gold Silla crown now housed at the Gyeongju National Museum. Gyeongju was the royal capital of the Korean kingdom of Silla which flourished from the mid first century BC to the eight century AD. These crowns date from the fifth through seventh centuries. The exact nature of the crowns is unknown: ethnographers believe the magnificent shamanistic forms reflect a steppe influence (perhaps from Persia/Iran) but much about these crowns remains a mystery. We aren’t even sure if they were worn by the living or if they were solely exquisite grave goods.

The Scilla crowns were discovered in huge, nigh impregnable barrows which were only excavated in the 1920s. The coffins of the Silla nobles were placed in deep pits lined with wood. These were covered with dense clay and then with giant river boulders and then with a huge burial mound. This particular crown is 30.7 centimeters (one foot) in height and 18.4 centimeters (7.25 inches) in diameter. The headband is decorated with lovely abstruse leaf-shapes and bent jade ornaments called “gogok” comma-shaped curved jewels which are believed to be tied to bear worship (perhaps reflecting Japanese of Iranian influence).

Wikipedia blithely states that the crown reflects no Chinese influence and yet, “the right and left most branches, along with the middle branches of the five branches, are composed of the Chinese character 出 in three prongs. The tips of the branches are decorated with a budding flower ornament.” Hmmm—you will have to make up your own mind on that score (although finding anything anywhere in East Asia without some sort of Chinese influence is rare). Scholars who believe that the crowns reflect shamanistic influences see a tree in the gold shape (which seems like a bit of a stretch…but they do remind me a bit of Zhou Dynasty bronze work which was heavily influenced by animism/shamanism , so judge for yourself).

Silla began as one small state in the Samhan confederacies (loosely allied with Imperial China), but subsequently spread through the middle of the peninsula. During its heyday (around when these crowns were made) Silla succeeded in conquering the other two great kingdoms of Korea and briefly unifying the peninsula, but a parasitic entrenched aristocracy sapped it of its vitality and devoured it from within (a decline which was hastened by sectarianism, schism, and civil war). We still have these splendid crowns though…

Happy year of the Earth Dog! Today marks the beginning of Lunar Year 4715 in the Chinese calendar. Where did the time go? We have finally worked our way past all of the fire roosters and metal horses to the familiar dog—an exceedingly great animal! According to augury, the coming year will be a very good year, particularly vis a vis financial matters…however, the year will also be enervating and could feature health problems related to stress, exhaustion, and strife (it looks like the augurs have at least been reading the frontpage headlines).

The same Earth element which provides the success of the Earth Dog year will also mean there will be stretches of extreme dullness. Once again it seems like the oracles can see right into my actual life! Who writes this stuff? Finally, the site I looked at says “postponing and procrastinating are words you will need to remove from your vocabulary during this year.” Sadly, my vocabulary is very extensive and I am not about to forget THOSE words. However even for tempestuous & disorganized tigers, the dog year will be a year when projects come to fruition. The dog year is the eleventh year in the 12 year cycle so it is the beginning of a cycle of rebirth. We can look forward to that as well…and to some dumplings and fireworks!

Thanks to my exigent schedule, I can’t really have a dog in New York, but I love them. Dogs are the first domesticated animal by tens of thousands of years (or maybe much more). In their wild form, dogs are known as “wolves” and they are one of the apex predators of the Holocene. Wolves and humans are one of the all-time great pairings like Laurel and Hardy, peanut butter and jelly, or water and sodium—two super aggressive hierarchical social predators who just innately get each other (wait, what was Laurel and Hardy about again?). I have been meaning to write about dogs since they are dear to me (and since the converging stories of our two species explains things about living beings). I will do so next week to celebrate the Year of the Dog. For now though “Gǒu nián dà jí” – Lots of luck for this year of the dog!

For Valentine’s Day, I have saved this troubling obituary from the animal world. Last month, Nigel the lonely gannet died. Nigel lived on Mana Island, a desolate stony island about 25 kilometers northwest of Wellington, the capital of New Zealand. Mana Island was once the home to many sea birds, but after the island was intensively farmed during the 19th and 20th centuries, the colonies failed. The…nutrients…provided by the birds gave the island rich soil but, without the birds this abundance faded away and the island’s ecosystem crashed (this is a sort of microcosm of what happened to the larger New Zealand ecosystem during the 19th and 20th centuries as waves of invasive creatures swept the remote archipelago). New Zealand conservationists have been working to restore the empty island however they were left with a problem. Gannets live where other gannets live. How could they lure the oceangoing birds back to start a new bird colony?

The solution they settled upon was to play bird calls on electronic speakers and put out concrete decoys painted the handsome black white and ocher of live gannets, however this strategy did not lure gannets to Mana…except for Nigel. He arrived a few years ago and selected a beautiful replica gannet and began to woo his concrete love with mating displays, nests, and excited chatter. He even tried to preen her concrete feathers and explore physical intimacy with her. Videos of Nigel trying to impress his inanimate mate became a real hit in the human world (where analogies are not unknown). This year other living gannets finally arrived at Mana Island, and naturalists hoped that Nigel could find fulfillment and raise a family with a real bird, but it was not to be. In late January of 2018, a ranger found Nigel dead upon his nest next to his concrete consort. The futility of his life and bleak melancholy of his end have attracted worldwide attention.

Ornithologists have speculated that Nigel was an odd bird, somehow injured, addled, or damaged, which is why he left his original colony. His defects, if any, were certainly not visible to the human eye and he looked like a healthy handsome seabird. Gannets dive from 30 meters (100 feet), and achieve speeds of 100 kilometres per hour (62 mph) as they enter the water. Their speed and mass, and matchless skill as divers enables them to catch large fish deeper than most airborne birds can venture. Nigel did all of this, but things just didn’t work out.

Except, maybe they did: there are now gannets nesting on Mana Island, brought there not by statues, but by a live gannet. As one contemplates Nigel’s lonely life, it is hard not to imagine HIM transformed into a beautiful statue which says “Our Founder.” We will watch the colony with interest and see if the gannets make it after their 40-year absence from Mana.

Nigel’s life and his death raise bigger questions about the nature of life and how organisms work together, collectively and individually. This blog has visited these issues before in posts about blood, clonal colonies, lonely geese, and siphonophores (animals made of other animals where the individual zooids serve in the capacity of organs).

I have a long running philosophical argument with a friend concerning the nature of humankind. He asserts that each person is a magnificent individual—a whole self-contained universe. I don’t think that is correct. No animal is quite so solitary (unless it is the last of its kind) and especially not us: we are colony animals like mole rate or termites or honeybees. If you see one human, you have a whole infestation. This means our culture is as much who we are as ourselves (as becomes incredibly evident in heartbreaking cases of feral children or abused hermit loners). The splendid fantasy of being alone is just that—a fantasy. In reality we are as tied to our banks, gas companies, annoying colleagues, and odious loudmouth leaders more than we would ever like to admit. We will come back to these ideas in subsequent posts, but for now Happy Valentine’s Day and RIP Nigel. There really should be a statue of him, we could all see some of ourselves in that stone mirror…and some of humanity’s real nature in the living colony birds coming back to roost on desolate Mana Island.

I’m really enjoying the Winter Olympics! South Korea looks great and has clearly pulled out all of the stops hosting. I especially like the elegant “victory ceremony” women who guide the athletes in behavior and protocol at the Olympic medal platforms—these women are like an amazing cross between super models, Santa Claus, and Batman’s butler. In addition to Olympic medals, they ply victors with abstruse puzzle sculptures and stuffed animals (and gentle stage directions). The reason I am writing tonight though is to look back at the huge dove of peace which was formed by human performers bearing lights during the opening ceremony. I am…skeptical of North Korea’s motivations in the troubled affairs of Korea. I share American Defense Secretary Mattis’ concern that North Korea’s long game is to unify the peninsula under Kim rule by means of nuclear coercion. Yet it was indeed touching to see the generosity and elan of the South Korean hosts sharing their moment in the international spotlight with their wayward sister nation, and the glowing dove made of humans was moving (and visually splendid).

I’m going to go watch some more winter sports now (hooray Chloe Kim!) but this is going to be a great week, what with the Olympics, Mardi Gras, Valentine’s Day, and Chinese New Year. Best wishes to all of the Olympic athletes, and best wishes to the nations of Earth who look splendid when they assemble in peace and celebration.

When it comes to colors, our understanding has cultural and historical connotations. The names of colors change over time as points of cultural relevance change and as the language evolves. Many colors we are familiar with today (thanks to the miracles of synthetic chemistry and industrialization) were extremely esoteric to Europeans of the ancient and medieval world. The old Latin and Greek words for exotic colors were influenced by rare jewels and unusual birds (which might be the only shared terrestrial examples of hues which were only seen in sunsets and other mutable natural phenomena). We have already written about the ponderous word “icterine” an old Greco-Roman term for the beautiful pale yellow of various birds and insects. Today we take on an even more dissonant word which entered Middle-English in the 14th century from ancient Greek (possibly by way of France). “Smaragdine” is the bright blue-green color of emeralds. It was a color which was rare and precious in the 14th century world. The word has lingered in the corners of English and is still on the books today (although, if you ask your colleague to hand you the smaragdine mousepad you might not get the green one…or anything other than an angry stare or sharp words). Even if the word smaragdine is not euphonic to modern ears, the color is exquisite and rich. The chief conclusion of this etymological diversion is that Ferrebeekeeper needs to write more about emeralds.

Congratulations to SpaceX, Elon Musk’s private space company for successfully testing its new heavy lift rocket, the Falcon Heavy, a reusable multi-stage heavy lift rocket for delivering large cargoes to Earth orbit or for traveling on cislunar or even interplanetary trips. The rocket is the largest conventional rocket built since the mighty Saturn V which took humankind to the moon (although the space shuttle’s elaborate boosters were capable of greater thrust). The Falcon Heavy vehicle is capable of producing 5 million pounds of thrust at liftoff–which means it can heft around around 63,800 kilograms (140,700 pounds) of payload into low-Earth orbit.

Today’s launch from Kennedy Space Center was largely successful: the top and bottom boosters landed safely on designated platforms. The center booster, alas, did not quite perform as hoped and slammed into the ocean. The rocket’s payload, Mr. Musk’s electric Tesla roadster (with a mannequin and sundry pop-culture science fiction novelty items) successfully entered a heliocentric orbit which will bring it back and forth between Mars and Earth as it loops around the sun. The launch paves the way for a new era of private industry in space (SpaceX plans to monetize subsequent Falcon Heavy rocket missions for government and commercial payloads and missions), but it is only a step on the way to a planned BFR (Big “Falcon” Rocket) for interplanetary missions. I am excited by that concept, though I hope Mr. Musk will take a moment to think about the top of Venus’ atmosphere as a potential destination as well as cold arid Mars. For right now though, hooray for this thrilling milestone!

This is the guardian god Tutu. Tutu is a god from the later period of Ancient Egyptian culture (indeed, the statue above may come from the Greco-Roman era…or even the Byzantine era of Egypt). Tutu was a son of the mysterious and dangerous goddess Neith (a creator goddess from outer darkness) but he was more familiar and comforting than Neith: Egyptians thought of Tutu as a god who protected mortals from Neith’s other more dangerous children–demons and nightmares from the world of darkness. Originally Tutu was a protector of tombs, but over the centuries he morphed into a guardian of sleep who protected slumbering commoners from nightmares. I really like this statue because he seems like a friendly (but maybe slightly silly) dream guardian. Although he has a cat’s body, his elongated torso makes me think of a dachshund and his pudgy hangdog face reminds me of Rodney Dangerfield or some such sadsack comedian. Let’s not even talk about the scorpions on his feet!

But I guess any protection from nightmares is better than none, and Tutu was popular in his day, during the twilight fadeout of Egypt’s ancient gods.

We have lots of unofficial holidays. Nearly every day of the year has multiple different sobriquets like “National Doughnut Day” or “National Wear Red Day” or whatever. Sometimes when I am chronically behind in my daily schedule I look at these lesser holidays for inspiration, and thus February 1st forcefully struck me. It’s “National Serpent Day” and serpents are a major topic here at Ferrebeekeeper. Yes! But then I was struck anew at what a strange choice of day this is for National Serpent Day. Serpents are ectothermic: the frigid first day of February, when winter’s dreadful wrack holds sway everywhere except for the very southern tip of the nation (and for naturally snake-free Hawaii) is a bad choice. To be blunt, most of the nation’s snakes are sleeping through National Snake Day in biological suspension called “brumation.” They are unable to appreciate the National Snake Day cakes, the festive snake-theme merchandise which marketing professionals are peddling, or the thoughtful cards we send them. Perhaps this choice of day, reflects the ambiguous feelings Americans have about snakes. We love sleek racing lines, amoral snakelike behavior, and poisonous politicians who tempt us with promises we know we should never consider…yet the snake is taboo in Judeo-Christian tradition, and many people are naturally phobic. I wonder if National Serpent Day is on a different day in snake-loving pantheistic societies like India, Ancient Greece, or China.

Anyway, to celebrate the day, I am including some coral snake pictures, since I think there is hardly a more beautiful animal than these colorful snakes with their beautiful scarlet, black, and red coloring. I also like their blunt foreshortened faces and laconic expressions. Also all the red will start getting us ready for Valentine’s Day. In the mean time enjoy National Serpent Day, by thinking about your favorite snakes (unless you live in the tropics or the Southern hemisphere, in which case you should go romp with your favorite legless friends).

This time of year, winter begins to drag on and I start to dream of the flower gardens of spring and summer. Unfortunately, the garden is currently a lifeless grey ruin beneath a layer of frost (although I personally know there are some bulbs down there sleeping until April), so, in order to enjoy the beauty of flowers, we need some help from art…which is where anonymous master artisans of the Ching dynasty come in. Above is an exceedingly fine famille rose tripod censer from the middle (?) of the Qianlong reign (the Qianlong emperor reigned longer than any sovereign in Chinese history from 1735 to 1796). It features auspicious symbols like twinned fish and a lucky vase amidst an otherworldy garden of calligraphic vines and splendid pink and white florets…all against a backdrop of imperial yellow like some divine custard. The censor’s amazing shape hearkens back to the ancient origins of Chinese ceremonial vessels and offers a glimpse of the shamanistic magics and animistic spirits (which are never far away from Chinese art), but its execution is pure 18th century ornate frivolity. The fulsome garden and brilliant spring colors would not look out of place in a piece from the other side of the world from Rococo France, yet there is something more satisfying in the flourishes and rootlets and buds of this Chinese garden. The brilliant colors will have to dispel the gray of winter and last until spring (but since they have been undiminished for more than 2 centuries, that should be no stretch.

Earlier this week I wrote about the (alleged) crown of Montezuma. The main element of that crown was not a gem or gold structural elements, but the exquisite iridescent emerald feathers of Pharomachrus mocinno, the resplendent quetzal. These birds live in the rainforests of Central America from southern Mexico down across Guatemala and into western Panama. They are solitary birds which generally eat fruit (which they supplement with small animals). They are weak fliers and are preyed on by hawks, eagles, owls, and even toucanets and squirrels (it must be embarrassing to be eaten by a small mean toucan or a squirrel).

Because of their exquisite feathers resplendent quetzals were associated with the flying snake god Quetzalcotl by various Mesoamerican civilizations. Elite individuals of the Maya and the Aztecs did indeed wear headdresses made from quetzal feathers, and it was taboo to kill the bird. Feathers were collected from captured birds which were set free (for quetzals do not flourish in captivity). They were seen as symbols of divinity, freedom, and wealth (Guatemalan money is known as the quetzal).

I wish I could tell you more about this jewel-like bird, but they quietly keep their secrets. A myth of the conquest is that before Spaniards came to the Americas, quetzals sang beautifully and had plain breasts, but since that time their breasts have been red with blood and they have been silent. They do indeed seem to be a stupendous visual phenomenon (like today’s post which is really about the pictures of this exquisite animal).